FROM the EDITORS:

IMPORTANT INFORMATION:Opinions expressed on the Insight Scoop weblog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the positions of Ignatius Press. Links on this weblog to articles do not necessarily imply agreement by the author or by Ignatius Press with the contents of the articles. Links are provided to foster discussion of important issues. Readers should make their own evaluations of the contents of such articles.

Anyone who has seen a sunrise from a
viewpoint overlooking a grand vista knows the wonder of seeing the
contours of the earth revealed as the light washes over the landscape
and chases away the shadows. A world once dark and confining becomes
bright and expansive, and a sense of direction and place is
enlivened.

In an analogous, but much more profound
way, the Transfiguration of the Lord (Lk. 9:28-36) was the light that
revealed to the disciples a world bright and expansive. It gave them
a brief but life-changing glimpse into the splendor of the kingdom of
God. “At His Transfiguration,” wrote St. Thomas Aquinas, “Christ
showed his disciples the splendor of His beauty, to which He will
shape and color those who are His…”

What does this have to do with today’s
Gospel? A great deal, for everything that happened after the
Transfiguration and led up to Christ’s Passion was illuminated and
touched by the glory seen by Peter, James, and John. And while those
three apostles kept silent about what they saw (Lk. 9:36), the
Evangelist Luke wanted his readers to understand the landscape of
Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem in the light of that glorious event.

When Jesus appointed seventy-two men
(or seventy, depending on the translation), he deliberately patterned
his action after the selection of seventy elders by Moses. Those men
were meant to share in the spirit given to Moses so that, as God told
Moses, “they may share the burden of the people with you” (Num.
11:16-17). Earlier, Jesus had given the Twelve “power and
authority” over demons and illness, then sent them to proclaim the
kingdom of God and to heal the sick (Lk. 9:1-6). Some of the Church
fathers understood this as an establishment of apostolic authority,
whereas the selection of the seventy pointed toward the establishment
of the priesthood, for priests are co-workers who assist the bishops
in their duties (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 886, 939).

But this action not only foreshadowed
the priesthood, it revealed even further the prophetic, missionary
character of Jesus’ work. Sent to proclaim the presence of the
kingdom of the God, the disciples were given strict, even ascetic,
directives: carry no money, carry no sandals, greet no one along the
way. They were exhorted to elicit a response, a decision for or
against Jesus and his message. “Jesus’ own understanding of his
and his followers’ identity,” explains N.T. Wright in Jesus
and the Victory of God (Fortress Press, 1996), “went far beyond
the picture of a teacher of miscellaneous truths or maxims. The
corporate identity of the new movement belonged firmly within the
world of Jewish eschatological expectations.”

The kingdom of God is the fulfillment
of those expectations about the meaning of history and God’s plan
for mankind—and the Church is “the seed and beginning of this
kingdom” (CCC, 567, 669). Christ established the kingdom by his
preaching and his Passion, and he entrusted the message of the
kingdom to the Twelve and to the Church so it would grow and so it
could be seen for those with eyes to see. “In the word, in the
works, and in the presence of Christ, this kingdom was clearly open
to the view of men” (Lumen Gentium, 5).

But men will only see it if they turn
toward the light of the Lord, humbling gazing, if you will, upon the
Transfiguration so they might be transformed. This transformation,
St. Paul told the Galatians, comes by the way of “the cross of our
Lord Jesus Christ,” which brings about a new creation. Paul’s
blessing—“Peace and mercy to all who follow this rule”—was a
direct continuation of the peace granted to those who accepted the
disciples sent forth by Jesus: “Peace to this household.”

And every household that accepts Jesus
is taken into the household of God, the Church, which Paul called
“the Israel of God.” Within it, a world once dark and confining
becomes bright and expansive.

(This "Opening the Word" column originally appeared in the July 4, 2010, edition of Our Sunday Visitor newspaper.)